Expert identifies Finland’s most vulnerable infrastructure targets

Energy facilities, logistics centres, water services and food distribution are Finland’s most critical potential targets for sabotage, corporate security expert Tommi Nyström says, according to Yle.

European security services have warned that Russia may carry out sabotage operations as its hybrid influence activities intensify. Germany has found an explosive drone at an airport, while Denmark’s security service PET has warned of possible Russian attacks on the defence industry.

Finland’s Security and Intelligence Service has also said that the threat of sabotage is real. According to the agency, Russia is reactivating its sabotage activities in Europe after a quieter period.

Nyström says the warnings from security authorities should be taken seriously. He considers the energy industry, logistics centres, water services and food distribution to be the most critical potential targets in Finland.

“If we lose electricity, we lose data networks, and food and water distribution will be disrupted. These things would affect society immediately,” he says.

Defence industry companies and high technology businesses fall into a second category, Nyström says. Sabotage against them would not be immediately visible to citizens but would have more strategic consequences.

Nyström does not want to identify individual vulnerable targets because security arrangements for protecting critical infrastructure are confidential. He says, however, that public and open facilities are inherently more vulnerable.

“Anything that must be available and open to the public creates vulnerabilities,” he says.

Nyström says Finland now needs to consider more carefully how different facilities are protected and what factors make them vulnerable.

Nyström rejects wider use of armed guards

In Finland, companies are responsible for their own security arrangements, regardless of whether their operations are critical to society. In practice, companies buy security services from private guarding firms regulated by the Act on Private Security Services.

The law permits armed guards to work as bodyguards, in valuables transport and at facilities considered important to society. At present, armed guards are mainly used at nuclear power plants.

Nyström teaches the use of force tactics and techniques at the Luksia education consortium. He also has decades of experience managing specialised security services in Finland and abroad. He has carried a weapon while working as a bodyguard and led armed security teams.

Despite this background, he does not support expanding the use of armed guards to protect critical infrastructure.

“It works in the same way as a vehicle’s airbag. If nothing else helps, this kind of option can ultimately be considered,” Nyström says.

Introducing armed guards would require a major training effort, he says. Completing firearms training alone would not be enough. Guards would also need to practise different tactics for extreme situations.

According to Nyström, simply visiting a shooting range does not make anyone capable of using lethal force in an extreme situation.

“It is a little like hitting a punching bag and then stepping into a ring to fight a real person. Hitting the bag alone does not prepare you for a boxing match,” he says.

Nyström stresses that avoiding a fight is the best fight. He says private security companies currently have no official direct channel for reporting their observations to the authorities, and that effective information exchange cannot be built solely through tip lines or personal contacts.

“Information sharing and intelligence gathering between the authorities and the private security sector must be developed, because prevention is the most important thing.”